I wasn't sure whether to post this here or in The Database Forum forum so feel free to move it if it's in the wrong place

Ok, well i bought a website the other day but the only problem is i never got the MySQL database because the host deleted the site before they were able to make a back-up. I was talking to someone the other day and he said he thought there was some kind of program or something that could look through the PHP scripts for the site, at the mysql_querys and produce the database structure, is this true? It would be a great help to me if it is, because at the moment i'm having to go through all the scripts and do it my self and it's taking ages.

You could do this but it is tedious and prone to errors for anything slightly complicated.

Most packages have some kind of install script are they still on the site ? or has the original owner any backups of the sql database in CSV or SQL scripts

Nope, all i have is a load of PHP scripts.

If this was a turnkey script look for file named install.php in the files you received. If the last guy was sloppy it might still be there. This file is typically used to install the tables in a mysql DB.

no its not that kind of thing, i just bought his website but he couldn't make a back-up of the MySQL database quick enough. All it is is a load of PHP files, with no install files at all because its not something that is going to be distributed.

At the moment i'm having to go through the scripts, and if i see something getting inserted into say the user table then i create user table and so on. But the problem is the website has a big database structure and will take ages to make this way.